Root Rot in S/H? What am I doing wrong?

[orchidkitty]

everyone

I started using a S/H setup with my Phal for the first time back in July of this year. I'm still quite a newbie at being an Orchid owner so please forgive me for any obvious mistakes here...

Before this I had my phal in a very airy basket with a lot of holes, in sphag moss. I was having lots of issues with root rot when I first purchased the orchid so I moved it to the more airy basket in hopes of preventing that. It did stop root rot but ended up dehydrating the plant, because the moss would dry up way too fast and I couldn't keep up with the watering.

I discovered S/H earlier this year and moved my phal into it hoping that it would be a happy medium that keeps it hydrated without root rot.

At the time I wanted to buy a setup I could use immediately without having to do DIY. I purchased an orchid pot that basically has a basket on the side with slits along the side and a rope to wick the water up. On the outside there is another pot without holes that acts as the water reservoir. Forgive me if this is not truly "S/H", but I figured it is close enough since it involves having a water reservoir and a "self watering" setup.

My orchid seemed to really like the transition. I repotted it into the new pot with leca back in July, and over the summer it grew roots and new leaves crazy fast. I didn't see any issues with the roots that were visible (unfortunately basket is black so couldn't see all roots inside) and at least no signs of root rot at the time.

There are two root that actually through the slits in the basket (this phal loves to squeeze roots through the tiniest openings) and one actually went to the very bottom of the reservoir and directly into the water. In the photos you can see it's the one that's very obviously an "L" shape because it reached the bottom and then grew horizontally. Also in photo you can see the hole I had to cut around the root to get it out.

The 2nd root that grew through the air slit was going horizontally, white and doing really well. As far as I could tell all the roots were plump and healthy, with cute fuzz around it (which it never had before when dehydrated )

However things took a turn in the recent 2 weeks. I check my orchid regularly and suddenly discovered the 2nd root growing horizontally through the slit had turned black and its original white color is steadily going brown. I left it alone for a few days and then yesterday examined it again and unfortunately very obvious white fuzzy mold/fungus was growing on the black parts -- definitely not the hair fuzz but actually mold.

I panicked a little bit because I was very worried the mold would spread to other roots and decided to try and cut away the moldy root. However, because there's these 2 roots growing through the basket slits I could not get at them without removing the entire plant and repotting it. When I took the plant out I was really surprised to see that so many of the roots actually are looking brown/rotting. I decided to clip the rotting ones also due to fear of molding.

I have heard that orchids may need time to readjust to S/H, especially one like mine that came from a very dry environment previously. However I was surprised that the rotting seemed to be on new growth, and that it seemed to be doing fine until just recently. But I can't be sure because the basket is black and maybe I just couldn't see the roots starting to rot back in July.

I also wonder if it has to do with adding fertilizer? I have started adding the tiniest amount starting about a month ago, pretty infrequently, since I am pretty paranoid about overdoing it. But maybe I did because I don't think I was properly flushing the pot after adding fertilizer. Additionally, I did notice that the roots started having black spots (hopefully visible in the photos) - I'm not sure if this started with the fertilizer, I want to say it was pre-fertilizer and slowly started showing up in the last 1-2months, but my memory could be wrong...

Additionally this phal LOVES growing aerial roots and I was concerned they would get dry compared to the roots inside the basket, so I started putting on a humidifier in the room about 2-3 feet from the phal, with a little fan blowing that rotates as it blows. I started doing this about 2-3 weeks ago when the temperature dropped and I started to worry the home heating would dry up the room. The humidifier was as much for the plant as it is for me as well

I have included some photos taken while re-potting. I had to repot fairly quickly because it's actually very late today and past bedtime, but I really wanted to get that big patch of mold out. The “L” shaped root previously in the water I wasn’t able to get it back into the pot - should I make more of an effort to put it back through the hole I cut so it can dip into the water again? I do see it has dried up quite fast after repotting since it’s not used to the new drier environment.

Really looking forward to hearing everyone's thoughts on what I did wrong here and could do differently. This phal has been with me for many years so I am quite attached to it, and would really like to see it flourish (and bloom!)

Thank you!~~

PS. There IS a dried white with black patch on two leaves (visible in one photo) that have been there since before being repotted into S/H. I don't know what caused it but I think since being moved to S/H it has stopped expanding and being a problem. At least I hope so!